More than 100 convicted sex offenders are living illegally in public housing more than a year after federal and city officials were publicly informed of their existence, according to a new report by a City Council member of Queens, Eric Gioia.

A likely candidate for public advocate in 2009, Mr. Gioia says an investigation by his office discovered there are at least 112 sex offenders living in public housing projects across the city, including 48 in Brooklyn, 28 in Manhattan, and 26 in Queens, despite both federal and local regulations making it illegal for them to reside in such developments.

“I was obviously surprised and disappointed when this week we discovered there are over 100 sex offenders living illegally in public housing right now,” Mr. Gioia said in a telephone interview yesterday. “It’s illegal, it’s against federal law, it’s against city policy, and it’s simply wrong to have taxpayers subsidizing pedophiles and rapists in public housing.”

Federal law requires public housing authorities to reject any applicants who are on a lifetime sex offender registry. Residents of the city’s public housing pay a fraction of market rate rents.

Officials from the New York City Housing Authority said it is addressing the issue of ex-convicts who flout such laws.

“We are disappointed that the councilman did not inform us about his investigation on such an important issue,” a spokeswoman for NYCHA, Millie Molina, said in a statement yesterday. “NYCHA continues to work aggressively with the NYPD, the Inspector General and HUD to remove sex offenders and other undesirable elements from public housing.”

Mr. Gioia released the results of a similar investigation in November 2006 that found more than 200 sex offenders in public housing. In 2007, the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development and the city’s Department of Investigation moved to evict 78 sex offenders living in public housing following an operation by a joint task force consisting of local and federal law enforcement officials.

“Considering that I first shared this information 16 months ago, the only thing NYCHA should be surprised about is that sex offenders are still living illegally in housing they are responsible for,” Mr. Gioia said.

About 5,600 sex offenders live in New York City, according to state records. Mr. Gioia’s investigation discovered the presence of sex offenders in public housing by finding that the listed addresses in the state’s sex offender registry matched the addresses of public housing projects.

Where to house sex offenders after they’re released from jail has become a complex policy question in states and municipalities across the country in recent years. New York State law requires that all sex offenders be registered in a searchable database with an accompanying picture, but offers no restrictions on where they can live. Sex offenders also face local residency laws restricting them from living within a certain distance of a school, playground, public park, day care center, or bus stop.

“There’s nothing, as far as I understand, in the human rights law or any other laws that would deem it to be a discriminatory act,” a real estate lawyer, Steven Ganfer, said in an interview yesterday. He said that the boards of cooperative apartments, who have broad legal authority to turn away tenants without disclosing their reasons, could also turn down prospective owners with criminal histories.

Advocates of residency restrictions for sex offenders say they protect children from repeat offenders, but the restrictions have also drawn criticism from a variety of groups, including human rights organizations and some child abuse prevention organizations.

“Right now, there really isn’t any evidence that proximity is related to recidivism,” a professor of human services at Lynn University, Jill Levenson, said in an interview. She suggested that laws restricting sex offenders from loitering near public places frequented by children would be more effective than residency restrictions. “The irony of residency laws is that they may restrict where people sleep at night but they don’t prevent a sex offender from being places in the day where they could cultivate relationships with children and engage in that kind of behavior,” Ms. Levenson said.